seductive metadata control

[mjeppsen]

For anyone that had trouble finding the Cineform demonstration video in our video playlist at FreshDV, here is a direct html link with a QT MOV download.
http://www.freshdv.com/2008/04/nab-2008-cineform.html

Thanks again to David Taylor for a fantastic presentation on a very intriguing product!

 

[lordtangent]

David, giving the RAW to RAW converter to early adopters for FREE is an awesome gesture. And 10FPS conversion speed is still fast enough to easily convert a days worth of multi-camera shooting overnight.

I'm tempted to get Prospect 4k even though it's WAYYYY over kill for my needs right now. I'm still using an HV20! But then I'd have the RAW to RAW option open to me later without having to spend the extra bread when I get my Scarlet.

Of course, that is casting my bet on Cineform big-time since a lot can happen in the market in one year. Though... based on your track record it seems like a pretty good bet. And if I HAD 12bit 4:4:4:4 at 4k now I'm sure I could figure out other uses for it, considering my business. (3D CGI)

Here are some more questions for you:

What kind of render speeds are you seeing on final "Flattening" of the 4k RAW to 4k RGB? (Full quality demosiac, etc) How about 2k RGB? I'm guessing it could get really I/O bound if the target was DPX or TIFFs so let's assume I'm talking about Cineform RAW to Cineform 4:4:4 flattening. (for export to a post house that supports Cineform...or whatever)

How well threaded is Cineform Prospect in Premiere? How well are you seeing it scale on stuff like 8 core machines?

Last question. Can you talk at all about Cineforms involvement in Adobes CinemaRAW initiative?

 

[kmikami]

So how exactly does this work within After Effects? Take that video in the demo for example. In the RAW version there are some shadow details in her white clothing but when the look metadata is applied the whites get blown out. If you brought that footage into AE and threw on a levels effect could you pull those highlights back down and get the shadow detail back? Or do you have to take the cineform look off to access the full raw dynamic range?

 

[lordtangent]

Well, it's sending the image though the AVI or Quicktime interface to the software with the Metadata applied. So if the image is clamped in that "out" data from AVI or Quicktime, I assume you couldn't pull the image back down in After Effects. You'd have to remove the clampy Meta-data LUT or apply a flatter meta-data LUT to get the detail though the interface.

It's still an awesome feature though. The fact that you can non-destructively apply a look to everything for dailies or rough cuts as a matter of course, but switch it as is needed is quite cool. It makes a basic NLE much more powerful as a result.

What would REALLY be cool is if Speed Grade had access to this Cineform Active Meta Data and you could do color grading sort of "side band" in that database. Then EVERY application that decoded the RAW though Cineform would get it automatically. I mean, how cool is that? It would really help make the final conform/grade process a lot more distributable/collaborative and less linear. (Not sure how you'd do "Power Windows" and that sort of thing. But even just LUTS would be really cool.)